Page 161 of Ulune's Daughter

“Something wrong?” she asks.

“No, just a rash or something.”

“A rash.” Her voice goes flat and metallic. Her feather cloak flares around her shoulders. “No, it’s not a rash.Bromios.”

The heart under our hands skips a beat. I wish I didn’t know that name. I wish Cousin Kim had never stirred up my memories.

“Uh, who?”

Kellan blinks at me, her eyes burning blue in the cowl of her flickering cloak. No, not Kellan.Caileán.

“Don’t lie to me, my consort,” she whispers. “I feel his name graven in your flesh.”

I nod. “Grampy Niles told me. It’s the twenty-fourth glyph.”

Those arctic-fire eyes blink. “Rhodes, Rhodes, my beautiful weapon. You carry the true names of twenty-nine greater powers on your body. There’s no way for you to escape the coming battle. I’m sorry. I’d spare you if I could.”

The battle Cousin Kim wanted me to join. I thought I might evade it if I refused to help her, but Grampy Niles doomed me all those years ago. Some part of me has always known it. Some part of me has always been preparing for this final fight.

“Just ... stay by my side?”

“Always, my love.”

She hasn’t used that word before. Maybe it’s only an endearment. Before I face whatever’s come for me, I have to know.

“Do you, Caileán? Do you love me?”

“I’ve loved you for two thousand years. I’ve returned from true death to fight at your side.” Her eyes close for a moment and she tips her head back. An electric blue glow illuminates her throat, rising from my chest, but also from hers. “Bromios is here. Azrael’s chosen rises to face him. He calls the Mother’s blessed. It’s time, Rhodes. I’m sorry.”

“Me, too.” I swallow hard. “I love you. If ... if I don’t survive, tell Luca I love him.”

“I will.”

She doesn’t reassure me that I’ll survive. Does she feel the same thing I feel? I rejected Cousin Kim not just because I won’t let anyone use me against the people I love, but because I could feel the cold tug in my chest.

The pull of the grave.

Her fingers slide around mine. She squeezes my hand. “Time is an illusion to souls that are bound to each other. We will always find each other again.”

I nod against the tension knotting my muscles, the shaking that spreads through me.

“Come, my love,” she whispers and draws the claws of her free hand down through the Air.

We step out of Faery into a strange scene. An overly landscaped, dull green lawn stretches away from a ruined building on a low hill. On the lawn are hundreds of women. They rise from out of the ground, from spinning rings of flame, from behind a screen of evergreens at the far edge of the lawn. Skin and hair a rainbow of colors. Clothes ranging from colorful robes to business suits to jeans to pajamas. One woman just has a towel wrapped around her, soap suds still in her hair. There are teens in the crowd and women old enough to be my great-grandmother. There are a few men in the crowd, but it’s almost all women.

They’re all silent except for the sounds of their movement as they gather around the ruins.

A man stands in the ruins, wearing a green cloak, a golden helmet on his head.

“Most of you don’t know me,” he says. His voice is deep and ringing with power. “My name is Evan Lords. I’m the Capricorni Primus. The head of the Guild who should have been protecting and preserving the ley lines. Who should have been promoting peace and order in this world.” He reaches out to the woman at his side, who is wearing full, blindingly white armor. “I failed you.Wefailed you, all of you. We forgot our ancient charge. We became too focused on the material. I can only apologize to all of you and promise I will do better. If I survive this day, I’ll ensure the Capricorni take up the green mantle again. Not as mercenaries but as paladins. As protectors. What we once were, we will be again.”

Lords squeezes the fae warrior’s hand and lifts his chin to the crowd. “I haven’t earned the trust I’m about to ask of you. I wish I’d worn this Helm for years and proved to you I’m worthy of it. Instead, I have to ask you for a huge leap of faith. I have to ask you to believe my cause is the right one. That I stand against what is pushing our world further into chaos, hunger, sickness, and despair. I ask you to stand with me, give me your power, and push back against the storm.”

There’s a long moment of silence after he speaks. Then someone begins to clap. Lords turns around, looking for the clapper.

The crowd’s too thick for me to see who Lords is looking at, but I can hear her speak.

“That was inspiring, Mr. Lords. Truly. You give a good speech. But before my sisters make any unfortunate decisions, let me fill them in on some facts.”

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